


a flower in bloom

by orderlyhouse



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Crack, Don't copy to another site, F/M, Fluff, Humor, Ineffable Bureaucracy (Good Omens), Ineffable Husbands (Good Omens), Loss of Virginity, M/M, Oblivious Crowley (Good Omens), POV Third Person, Romance, She/Her Pronouns for Beelzebub (Good Omens), Translation, Virginity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-14
Updated: 2020-03-14
Packaged: 2021-02-28 23:26:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,312
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23145394
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orderlyhouse/pseuds/orderlyhouse
Summary: Crowley wasn’t liked in Hell for a lot of reasons, but This Reason ensured a surplus of questionable fame borderline with an unhealthy obsession.Translation of "Пока цветет роза" by erlander from Russian.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens), Beelzebub/Gabriel (Good Omens)
Comments: 5
Kudos: 63





	a flower in bloom

**Author's Note:**

  * For [erlander](https://archiveofourown.org/users/erlander/gifts).
  * A translation of [Пока цветет роза](https://archiveofourown.org/works/19729675) by [erlander](https://archiveofourown.org/users/erlander/pseuds/erlander). 



Crowley wasn’t liked in Hell for a lot of reasons, but This Reason ensured a surplus of questionable fame borderline with an unhealthy obsession.

Strictly speaking, the starting point for this would be, well, the fact that just like the angels are able to feel the waves of love, demons can do something like that too. Apart from that, because of the dark essence they acquired and the nature of their job, they can see even more shades of energy a creature radiates. They see the calibrations of its spirituality and sinfulness just as the meteorologists observe the clouds forming and moving on the surface of the Earth on a screen. If they lid their eyes and _look_ at their fellow demon, a gloomy aura, sometimes darker, sometimes lighter, encircles the demonic silhouette.

No one liked to _look_ at Crowley.

No one could not do this either.

***

Beelzebub regarded her staff grimly. Crowley was looking somewhere in the distance, each of his yellow eyes chose a different line of vision, ignoring the other one.

She couldn’t blame them. Fourteenth-century artists had little to none idea of realism, just yet. She was going to deal with it in her own, free of bureaucracy time, but there was a lack of such left for the hobbies. She was grateful that she was at least able to change fashion trends every five years or so, but still, you had to visit each country personally…

She finally tore her gaze away from the portrait she was holding in her hands and faced her team. They were desperately bored by the time being since nobody liked her announcement of an important talk they had to have before the start of their traditional orgy.

Not burdened with a need to be liked by them, Beelzebub blew on a portrait, enlarging it to a much greater size, and hung it on the wall with a thought.

The low buzzing of disgruntled voices stopped. The ones who thought that Crowley cross-eyed them hurried to change their seat. Random bold spots appeared in the huge, filled up to the brim auditorium. Beelzebub suppressed a sigh.

“Who’zzz going to tell me,” she said shortly, “why izzz Crowley not here today?”

Everyone was silent for a few seconds. Ligur raised his hand. It was not clear in the dark, but there was no certainty that he raised his own hand and not someone else’s.

“Because he doesn’t participate in this,” he said triumphantly.

“As it was from the beginning of times,” something that possibly belonged to the department of social studies reported. It was still unclear who came up with this one. Beelzebub suggested that things like this formed on their own in any structure. She was going to see if the humans would pick up the tendency.

“Amazzzing,” Beelzebub said slowly. “Perhapzzz, zzzomeone could tell me why?”

She eloquently glanced at the quieted demons. In the heart of an especially big bold spot, where she gazed extremely eloquently, Hastur was starting his last cigarette. He was terribly proud of this idea of his and has been desperately postponing introducing it to the human market for half a century so far. Beelzebub didn’t pressure him in that regard, because she suspected that the novelty wouldn’t be welcomed and she would have to deal with his disappointment for the next millennium. Hastur was awfully sensitive, in his nature.

And speaking of pressure…

“Fifteen centuries,” she said calmly. “Fifteen centuries ago I ordered you to get to know why he doesn’t attend the orgies. I ordered all of you. I even postponed the deadline three times.”

She held a pause, savouring in the word “deadline”. So far, Beelzebub has been suing Gabriel over its ownership for three hundred years. Solomon had her and the archangel’s faces appear in his nightmares, but that was all right: you didn’t mention great minds thinking alike with no repercussions, thinking you’re some great philosopher. Although, lately, she didn’t have any time to check on the contents of his dreams, and for the second session in a row the judge was suspiciously turning beet red and avoiding eye contact with both of them. This had to be looked at closer some time later.

“I’m lizzztening.”

Two hours later she had to admit another failure. During the group discussion (which seemed more like trying to find a scapegoat than coming up with a solution) everyone succumbed to fighting pretty quickly. They succumbed to making up pretty quickly as well since it was a well-known fact that an orgy was only better after a good fight.

At the end of the day, another meeting was postponed once again, approximately for six or seven centuries. She ordered, however, for them to double their diligence.

***

Crowley was right thinking that the fourteenth century was the worst period of time that has ever happened to him in the history of Earth.

He just wasn’t sure why.

***

“Orgy,” Hastur said.

“Mhm?” Crowley responded absentmindedly.

Hastur gave another once-over to the flash bastard in front of him and tried to remember the latest human trends Crowley could be affected by.

“Abstinence isn’t healthy,” Hastur said empathically.

His memory wasn’t that great either.

“Is that so,” Crowley hummed.

He was greatly disturbed by the frequent interest coming his way from the other demons, but none of these bastards succeeded in telling him what it was exactly that the Downstairs wanted from him.

“Why don’t you come over some time?” Hastur pressed on.

Passer-by’s seemed to pay his cigarette a lot of attention. Crowley dimly remembered something about negative connotations of red hair and acrid smoke coming together in European cultures.

“Oh, but I do,” Crowley said earnestly. He did, in fact, come over for the orgies, only to sit in some corner with a book borrowed from Aziraphale. No wonder he ended up losing any interest he had left in reading, with mental images like that.

“Uh-huh,” Hastur responded.

Crowley looked at him innocuously. Combined with an undeniably strong demonic aura his gaze made a particularly powerful impression.

Hastur realised that he couldn’t possibly solve this.

When it came to the kind locals setting them on fire, for some time at the beginning he didn’t even think to mind.

***

Ligur knew that keeping up with the modern times wasn’t his thing. He barely found some inner strength to work through Beelzebub’s task halfway to the end of the given time. There were, however, things he was good at.

Preparation, for example.

He studied Hastur’s report closely.

“’Tis one evasive serpent,” Hastur wrote, laboriously trying to copy the latest bureaucratic language of the chanceries, the standards of which more frequently reminded him of Gabriel. Beelzebub and Gabriel were suspiciously caught up on suing each other, Ligur thought disgruntledly. Dagon, being somewhat of a professional snitch, told him that Beelzebub kept the notes from the court sessions in her fly plushie. Which, one and a half century later, doubled in its size. In three centuries time it would be big enough to be passed as a hat. “He is whe'r slow, whe'r broken 'i his nature.”

The bottom of the transcript sported soot and a round mark of a cigarette falling from the mouth.

Ligur felt an urgent need for a cigarette too, but the idea of smoking went against the inner concepts he had about himself (because he was jealous of that idea. Last time Ligur came up with one it just happened to be the concept of roads, but the only place where they managed to resemble the original look that was planned for them was Ruthenia).

He hoped that the idea of introducing the coursework would be more successful.

At the same time, Ligur was thinking of starting a short treatise on sexuality in general and Crowley’s sexuality in particular. He could already see the titles. Suppression of natural desires. Demonic maturity delay. Denial of the sins of the flesh as a covert protest…

That would take a lot of time, of course, but Crowley was dozing for thirty years already anyway, and would probably continue doing the same in the next thirty at the very least. Besides, some brainy mortal could do all the work for him…

As if having heard him, a newborn Sigmund started crying louder somewhere on Earth.

***

Crowley fell quiet.

The demons watching his M-25 motorway presentation regarded him silently. The silence wasn’t ominous, which was especially unnerving. It just breathed doom.

Crowley cleared his throat and started to speak louder, tripling his enthusiasm and having no chance to overhear what the other demons were discussing because of it.

“His occult clock is running out of time,” Beelzebub said worriedly. She was twisting a small white feather in her hands. Hell had none of those, but the ones who were brave enough to point it out to her weren’t seen as well. Anywhere. Ever.

“It’s just in his nature.” In regards to him, Hastur has gone through every single stage of grief there was by the time the twentieth century rolled over, from “this isn’t healthy” to “well, to hell with him, then.” At this particular moment, he was the closest he could be to benevolent forgiveness. The fault of his sensitive nature, no doubt.

“ **SUBLIMATION** ,” Ligur said. Frankly, everyone was tired enough of him and only kept him around for the sake of nostalgia. Besides, his being behind the progress for 70 (or, in some cases, 700) years was a never-ending source of gags. You could already sense memes, just the concept of them for now, in Hell’s tense air.

The air was especially tense around Crowley.

They all looked at him again.

Crowley was shining like a Christmas tree. Not because he was so excited about some stupid motorway. He was shining if he was _looked at_.

He was surrounded by gloomy swirls of smugness, red blobs of passions, and green clots of envy. A cobweb of trickery enveloped the whole of his aura.

It all looked rather impressive, considering the light of innocence that glowed brighter the more Crowley acted out. He didn’t even suspect that 80% of the time the demons stared at him in complete silence not because they found his personality that exciting. The truth was, they were rather impressed by the levels of arrogance Crowley reached lying about his wickedness while being a step away from having a halo.

For demons, obviously, nothing is sacred, but they just couldn’t disrespect this kind of nerve.

If only they knew that Crowley had no idea that he was, quite literally, sporting “ **THE LAST VIRGIN OF HELL** ” written on his forehead, they would, probably, be terribly disappointed.

***

Armageddon didn’t happen. Lately, Beelzebub even stopped worrying about this. In the end, the never-ending stream of the souls would be terribly inconvenient. Besides, the structure of their archive would probably not bear this kind of pressure. It was, after all, archaic. Archi-archaic.

Beelzebub was especially proud of her puns. She allowed herself a brittle smile.

Since she came to Earth already… Just having experienced an arch— well, divinity— well, being in a good state of mind… Shall she visit Crowley?

Just to have a peek if he grew out a real halo after the holy water bath or not. If he did, she could get it in the face of another one of a shared archetype, and wasn’t that a great possibility for puns.

She mouthed something to herself on her way, picking out the best lines in her head. When she finally reached the street she needed and was about to cross the road, she stopped.

On the opposite side, the two were exiting the building. These two figures, so unlike each other, she would recognize anywhere now. Beelzebub squinted and _looked_.

Froze.

Tilted her head to the side in surprise.

Chuckled.

“So that’s who the flower was for,” she said softly.

With a sneer. And with admiration.

She turned on her heels and dissolved into thin air, already mapping out a note in her head.

***

Gabriel, Michael, Uriel, and Sandalphon stood silently on the roof and looked down. Not walls, nor distances managed to obstacle their gazes. Gabriel was absentmindedly thumbing a piece of paper he was clutching in his palm. That was the thing that led them here today.

At last, when the silence became unbearable, archangels reached for their pockets. Rings, books, scriptures, daggers and bottles were passed from one pair of hands to the other.

Sandalphon was smiling brightly, storing the prizes into his briefcase. Even then, 3000 years ago, he knew what he should bet on.

The fact that he could have won if only Beelzebub hinted to him, even back in the times of mutual lawsuits, about the possibility of considering Crowley was pissing Gabriel off especially hard. Oh, now he absolutely had to teach her a lesson. He felt pleasantly excited at the thought and found himself picturing a vigorous fight between good and evil. A precisely local one.

He was the last to leave the roof, looking back for just a second and eloquently pursing his lips, touched by a light blow of jealousy.

In the depth of the bookshop, for the first time in 6000 years, pornography was taking place.

***

_This book - the first and only work of a less known contemporary of Sigmund Freud that was recently discovered in the archives of Psychoanalytic Society. The work sheds a light on the inner world of a remarkable soul – doubting, hopeful, yearning, gentle and passionate. Applying true craftsmanship, the author analyses a difficult life path of a person who doesn’t fit into a modern society that steeped in vice, became cynical and callous. We invite you to experience this heartfelt journey full of sensuality and sexuality with us._

_“A flower in bloom” by L. I. Gur – coming soon to the stores._

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you erlander once again for allowing me to translate your work. Please give them your love 👀  
> Also thank you to people in Ace Omens discord who wanted to see this fic translated.
> 
> [Tumblr](https://polkanote.tumblr.com/)


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